Nothing is simple anymore. Take value investing, for example.
This strategy used to be cut-and-dried. Basically, portfolio
managers bought good companies selling at low multiples--in other
words, on the cheap. Today, however, not all value funds are
created equally. Just look at the Thornburg Value Fund. It's
got a mind all its own.

Bill Fries, portfolio manager of the Thornburg fund, cuts a
broad cloth when he's shopping for companies in which to invest
the fund's assets. "We look at low price-to-earnings, low
price-to-cash, above-average dividend yield and that kind of
thing," says Fries, who has been at the fund's helm since
its inception in 1995. "But we also buy consistent
growers--blue chip stocks. And we have a small portion of the
portfolio in emerging companies."

Why does Fries invest in so many different types of companies?
First, he wants to build a diversified portfolio of securities. And
second, he says there are different contexts of value. "A
consistent grower, for instance, may be a company that's spent
billions of dollars over decades building its name--and that has
value," he explains.

But that kind of value isn't easy to quantify, especially
for by-the-book value thinkers.

PepsiCo is an example of a consistent grower that's in the
fund's portfolio. Many value fund portfolio managers would
never consider it a value buy. One reason: At the time this piece
was written, it was selling at about 24 times earnings, and a lot
of value camp people would find that too pricey. But not Fries.
"Given the profit-ability of the enterprise and the core
Frito-Lay snack food franchise along with the Pepsi beverage
franchise, there's value in there," he says.

Then there are the emerging franchise companies you'll find
in the fund, fast growers like Advent Software, Fox Entertainment
and Novellus System. They're in the fund because, says Fries,
"Growth is not a dirty word to me."

The portfolio contains about 47 stocks, and total holdings
won't vary much beyond that; Fries wants "every stock to
count." And count they have. The fund's average annual
total return has been well over 27.52 percent, despite the fact
that the value stocks have been down and are still rebuilding.

Look at the fund's asset allocation and you'll find
nearly 21 percent in-vested in technology stocks, 6 percent in
financial institutions, 7 percent in investment management firms,
and the rest in everything from rail-roads to travel service
companies.

No matter what type of company this manager selects, there's
one rule of thumb he follows: Buy the stocks when they're out
of favor. So even though Fries has stretched the meaning of value
beyond what some might consider its natural state, he's firm on
that front.

On the risk meter, even though the Thornburg Value Fund's
diversity of value-type holdings might provide shareholders with
some cushion as market tides turn and performance winners see-saw
between growth and value stocks, it's not risk-free. But maybe
the game isn't so much one of choosing between the two as it is
of finding the priced-right winners.